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The imperial cult played important role throughout the whole antique world. It reached Rome with Caesar. In the centuries following him the divinity of the emperors were accepted by the whole population of the empire. The cult — in the eyes of the Roman population — assured the wellbeing of the state and its inhabitants. The only exception were Christians (together with Jews), who on the bases of their faith regarded emperor worship as idolatry. This is why, they became, in the eyes of the contemporary Roman population, atheists and the enemy of the state. This paper deals with the new results of the research of the imperial cult of Rome and its relationship with Christians.
Painted dedication to Genius and a relief depicting aquila from a sanctuary in Sopianae
(Appendix to the study: Painted depiction of Genius of Sopianae by Anita Kirchhof)
In the locality of Sopianae, Pannonia Inferior, at the east corner of the settlement, there was a presumably customs station built at the end of the 2nd century which existed till 258–260 AD. From one of the rooms of the building excavated on Kossuth Square, Pécs, a fresco depicting a Genius, an inscription belonging to it, two pedestals – probably bases for statues – and a statue of an eagle came to light. Based on the assemblage the room may have been the sanctuary (sacellum) of the official building. The rare but formal telonium or teloneum expression may have been used for this customs station which, as such, belonged to the organization of the Publicum portorium Illyrici. The only surviving inscription may have been dedicated to the genius of the employees or the armed guards of the customs station: Genio | cu(stodiarum?) tel(onei?). On the pedestal bases probably emperor statues were situated. On the eastern wall of the west–east oriented room, based on its own pedestal and generally because of its quality, there was the relief of an eagle placed in a niche personalizing Iuppiter and the imperial power. In this case the eagle can be taken as a state-imperial symbol found in its own context and thus belonged to the rare Roman Age relics of the administration. The sanctuary must basically serve the official imperial cult.
. 16 2 1253 Fischwick D. 1983 The Imperial Cult in the Latin West. I-II. Leiden. The Imperial Cult in the
in Siebenbürgen. JÖAI 5 94 136 Fishwick, D. 1987 The Imperial Cult in the
those whom Caracalla had condemned. 43 About the imperial cult, Dio evokes first Julius Caesar's cult, then that of Octavian/Augustus, and then that of all the emperors in succession
universal behavioural guideline. Devotion to the ancient religious traditions of Rome, and the imperial cult as an ideological instrument to ensure cohesion among different social groups, stopped being recognisable factors when moral and above all spiritual
